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and directions for action were well in place. Among the hardest tasks for staff and parents in that fi rst year was being willing to let go of old aspects of the school’s culture in order to start shifting to the newly-agreed purpose. The process used in that fi rst year would underpin all future joint annual community conferences using student, parent and teacher leaders to set the directions and challenge thinking. As a result, in 2003, new thinking saw changes and improvements made that affi rmed that learning was and remains the focus of everyone in the school. In a school where student learning is the heart of the matter, leadership is for learn- ing and the school’s leaders have to be com- mitted, skilled and persistent in creating a strong learning culture and designing learn- ing that will embed that culture in all areas of the school’s work. the principal: architect of a culture of learning School leadership for learning is never just about the principal, although successful prin- cipals have a key role in the leadership of the school. This key role was strongly supported in the literature and research with principals that resulted in the New South Wales Second- ary Principals’ Council (NSWSPC) Leader- ship of Secondary Education statement: ‘Principals uniquely link the broader sys- tem and society with the effective ongoing delivery of quality learning for students. It is they, more than any others, who mediate between any call for changes and the class- room response. It is principals who must lead the processes of improvement and inno- vation and who are primarily accountable for the outcomes of these processes.’ In the project, the NSWSPC tried to iden- tify what secondary school principals actually thought they did, by asking two questions. First, what do you do day to day? The answers, repeated in many subsequent focus groups, can be summarised as ‘adminis- trivia’ and ‘issues management.’ Second, what is the heart of your role? These answers encompassed teaching and learning, pro- fessional development of staff, envisaging, planning, ideas management, evaluating and matters related to improving the quality of student performance. The answers were not a surprise, nor was the fact that principals had to ‘sched- ule time’ to get to the heart of their roles. What was a surprise was the coherent view from principals in different settings, of dif- ferent experience levels and with the differ- ent pathways travelled to the leadership of a secondary or central school. Principals said they wanted to lead for learning and they said they felt they had a critical role in making that happen. They were also able to identify the skills this leadership required and believed they had the skills to make a signifi cant difference in their schools. If the principal is a learning and leader- ship architect, he or she will need some highly-specialised skills and understandings. These will not be just the mechanistic skills that can be learned from books or comput- ers, online learning courses or compliance training. They will include high-order skills in communication, creating change in com- plex contexts, culture shifting and, most critically, higher-level educational and pro- fessional expertise. It’s a given that they will already have an excellent understanding of their own strengths and skills as teachers and leaders, and of the nature of interper- sonal relationship building, as well as a sound understanding of the leadership and learning strategies that work in schools. feature – leadership 13